Catching A Criminal In The ACT

[dkvfx]

Okay folks.

This will arguably not belong on this site, but I've spent hours trying to find a more relevant site to post to. Apart from you guys, Ive got my friends at NewModellerRailways and Astronomy... it felt you were the first port of call. I'm reaching out to the Sherlock/A-Team/MacGyver's out there. If you know a better place, then please let me know.

My car has been "broken into" now on three occasions.

The first time was months ago, and I found that the glovebox and central bins had been ransacked....nothing gone but maybe some loose change.

Second time, after my son had accessed the car, and maybe not locked the car properly. Electronic central locking no longer works. Same result.

Yesterday, from 3.30pm the previous day and 7:50am someone accessed the car again. My fault, my son shut the passenger door after I turned my drivers side key to lock the door.

In such a short time frame, I'm sure someone is systematically checking my car to see if its locked or not.

I've talked to the police, and they wont do anything as I have no evidence.

So now I'm looking into smart ways to build up a case.

I'm guessing its some little twerp opportunist, but I want to nip it in the bud before he/she gets too confident. I've been a victim of theft so many times before and I'm fed up with the lack of help.

I could spend £1000+ getting my home CCTV'd, but I'm looking for a less obvious solution, and one that just doesnt deter, but actually catches this guy.

My first thoughts are to fix a micro switch inside my door to alert me to as and when this person is trying to access my car, maybe simply hard wired to the buttons of a cheap electronic watch's stop watch, so I can gauge a pattern. I bet this guy is doing it at the same time each day.

Ultimately I will spring a full on trap, but I thought I'd pass it out to you guys first.

My electronics ability is clumsy at best. I'm looking at ways I can utilise cheap off the shelf components to eventually ensnare this guy, without him realising I'm doing it.

Your thoughts welcome

Hell it might actually be fun

Scooby and the Mystery Machine in full swing. Except this time its an old fart catching a meddling kid.

Dunc

 

[ronsimpson]

A video camera (used) does not cost much. Some will record for 6 hours on a tape. Mine will record in B&W at night, with out light. If you started it each night at bed time it might catch someone.

It will take some work to make it start when the car door is opened. You could get a motion sensor night light and remove the light and plug in the recorder. Only at night, when there is motion and for 5 minute after that, power will go to the recorder or video camera.

 

[Gobbledok]

You can get digital recorders with cameras for around the AU$400 mark.

Some of them (not sure about the cheaper ones) can already do motion detection by comparing frames and don't record until the detect motion.

Who knows, maybe you catch the little **** and can then sell your 'as new' video system

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

In an old car, I was able to wire the exterior door handles to a micro switch, so the alarm was triggered BEFORE you actually got into the car. Once I had a stereo stolen from the trunk. They traded me about 10 lbs of Lentils for my stereo. They just popped the trunk latch and they were gone and close it when they were done. I was 50 miles away and home before I noticed it.

So, I got an alarm. I was parked in a parking lot. They popped the trunk. Alarm was blaring. So what. It's grab and run. Then there was the ice pick in the side wall thing that happened in the rain. I wasn't happy. That happened 2x in my lifetime, so far.

 

[alec_t]

A camera/recorder sounds a good idea. Just make sure it's well concealed or securely fixed/protected...otherwise it may well be the thief's target itself. A friend of mine installed security lights on his house one weekend. On the Monday morning he found they'd been stolen

 

[4pyros]

Look up nanny cam.

 

[DerStrom8]

What exactly have they been stealing?

 

[ronsimpson]

Kids, at night, go down the street and look for a unlocked door. They take change, credit cards, check books, any thing small left in a car. The ones I am watching have a rout. It takes about a week to get back to the same street. The parents drive the kids to a spot and let them out, then pick them up about 10 blocks down the road. A child will go to jail for steeling $1.35 in change from a car. It turns out the parents did go to court for forcing the kids to work late at night in a unsafe environment with out supervision.

 

[3v0]

Unless you get lucky it may be hard to make an positive ID good enough for the legal system from a video esp at night.

 

[DerStrom8]

Unless you get lucky it may be hard to make an positive ID good enough for the legal system from a video esp at night.

You could also rig up a digital camera inside the car (hidden, of course) to keep snapping pictures as long as the door is open. Hopefully you'd get a good closeup shot of the perp. Maybe set up an IR lighting system so that he can't see the light, but he's still lit up when the camera takes the shots.

 

[dkvfx]

You've all hit on the most obvious choice, that of using some kind of camera. And that will be the ultimate goal in the end to catch the git in the act.
There are several cons against that at the moment, and I'll list those.

1: I don't want the guy to open the door....yet. Its enough that he's trying the handle.
2: It could be weeks before he tries again, and without a direct method of triggering a camera either digital or tape, I'd end up with loads of footage to scan through each day.
3: It's possible that even a hidden camera could be spotted. I don't want to risk giving the game away too early.
4: A camera in the car would need to be set-up to get a decent image through the window of the car, making it kind of obvious, but with no advantage of seeing where the guy comes from.
5: An outdoor camera will have to be weather proof, and therefore expensive.

One crazy idea I had would be to smear a thin film of vaseline on the handle of the car. If the handle is tried the vaseline would show signs of disturbance, or even a finger print! At least I could guess the number of attempts made over a period of time. The only problem with that is the guy might find it a bit weird that the car is lubed up! Not an electronics solution, but like I've already said, I haven't found anywhere else to discuss this.

Another forensics idea I've had is to place a clean blank CD strategically in the center well of the car... looks interesting. The perp picks it up, turns it over to see written on the front "School Trip Photo's" - no so interesting and throws it away....leaving possible prints. But obviously I want to save that for the big sting!! Which will be totally videoed and documented and put on Youtube!!!

Dunc

 

[3v0]

I expect the police and DA will yawn when you show them pictures.

If the car is on your property work out something with motion detectors or such to scare them away. It is about all you can really do.

You may be able to detect a capacitance change when someone touches the car door handle. Maybe.

 

[4pyros]

Charge the car up to a few thousand volts. oops did I say that out loud?

 

[ronsimpson]

I was going to take off the inside door handles. (trap) After talking to the police about that I decided to let the kids go through the car once a week. If someone gets slightly hurt this goes from a $1.56 loss to a million dollar problem.

 

[dkvfx]

I expect the police and DA will yawn when you show them pictures.

If the car is on your property work out something with motion detectors or such to scare them away. It is about all you can really do.

You may be able to detect a capacitance change when someone touches the car door handle. Maybe.

I should point out that I live in the UK. The Police here are possibly a bit more helpful. They can't investigate at the moment as there is little evidence for them to go on. But that can change. Also, if it turns out its some lout from round the corner, we have "Community Support Officers" who will have stern words with the twerp, and hopefully steer him/her away from an escalating career in crime.

I like the idea of the change in capacitance, though I wouldn't know what to do with that.

 

[dkvfx]

Charge the car up to a few thousand volts. oops did I say that out loud?

Everybody's immediate thought, but a circle of dead birds, cats and squirrels around the car might look a bit suspicious.

 

[ronsimpson]

The problem with shocking the little ******* is they will break out the windows.
If you can't stop them from searching your car at 3:00am then you will never stop them from getting revenge on your car at 3:30am.

 

[dkvfx]

I've smeared a tiny bit of grease over the handle. If touched you can easily see it.

Some folks have suggested that person may be wearing gloves. We'll see when the grease is disturbed.

I must say though its pretty hard to pick coins out of the console trays without gloves.

 

[dkvfx]

The problem with shocking the little ******* is they will break out the windows.
If you can't stop them from searching your car at 3:00am then you will never stop them from getting revenge on your car at 3:30am.

I understand where you're coming from. But I'm not going to let this go. It's a really, really petty crime... at the moment. I need to break his/her confidence that they can get away with it before they get more adventurous. I don't think they have the confidence for reprisal action, but thats why I want to catch them, not scare them or just get them angry.

 

[DerStrom8]

You could easily hack a cheap digital camera to a motion detector so that it only starts taking video if motion is sensed. That's probably the easiest kind of surveillance camera, and if placed correctly, it might work the best too. Even if it doesn't take video, you can at least have it snap a string of photos.

Something to consider, do you really want to go through all the trouble, court meetings, etc just to catch the guy, or do you just want him to leave your car alone?